In loving memory of my daughter Jaime and her courageous 9-year battle with melanoma, I am a melanoma awareness advocate and the indoor tanning industry's worst nightmare!

Tuesday, August 12, 2014

Bzzzing for a Cancer Cure

Lately, we have been reading about a lot of bizarre "possible" cures for cancer. Most recently I have written blogs about the miraculous cure possibilities of smelling farts (Pull My Finger...Save a Life) and then came the amazing potential of cat poop (From Litterbox to Laboratory) as THE cure. And now today, part 3 of this suspenseful trilogy just streamed into my newsfeed.

(Side note: Speaking of venom, where you aware that the male duck-billed platypus, which carries venom inside ankle spurs, is one of the few venomous mammals? Consider your life enriched with this piece of trivia!)

But back to the bees, scorpions, and snakes (Ugh ... gives me the creeps but it's for the common good!!). Actually, the idea of venom-basedcures from fangs and stingers is not new. There is history of their use as far back as 67 BC. And the Brazilian pit viper venom has led to development of ACE inhibitors for high blood pressure.So perhaps this line of research isn't quite as bizarre as it might first appear, but,

could we just please find a cure for cancer already???

When my daughter Jaime was fighting cancer, there was talk about birch tree bark and mushrooms as a cure for her melanoma. NCI wanted to inject her with the herpes virus for their research. Some of her fellow melanoma patients were getting jolts of electricity. It's good that scientists are reaching ... really reaching and thinking outside the box ... to find a possible cure for cancer, but,

could we just please find a cure for cancer already???

Over the years, so many "encouraging" possibilities as cures for cancer have been suggested -- red wine, coffee, pine bark, peanut butter, blueberries, antioxidants (and then not antioxidants), vitamin C (or maybe vitamin C makes cancer worse), and even tanning beds according to the indoor tanning industry (but NOT to be believed). Just do a Google search for cancer cures -- cannabis oil, zebrafish, gold, cow urine, aspirin, frankincense, sloths. What the heck is a sloth anyway??? So it doesn't seem like I am asking too much when I plead,

could we just please find a cure for cancer already???

Now, I admit that I am not a patient person. But billions of dollars have been donated to cancer research over the many years of our "War on Cancer," and sadly, as you read this, way too many cancer patients are clinging to life, hoping and praying for a cure. It is too late for my forever-29-year-old Jaime and our family, but a cancer cure could make a huge difference in the lives of millions of others. So please keep these warriors and their families in mind when you experiment with cat poop parasites and odiferous gases and "nanobees," and maybe, just maybe,